Gary ballance bombshell switch

[secretzimbo]

Anyone else here think there would be no room for Byrom, Curran, Welch, Ballance, Melton, Evans, Williams, Ervine, Burl and Raza.
That's 9 pink Rhodesians and a brownish guy with Pakistani military training.
They would get that crowd control water cannon to disperse them
I'm just saying there's an acceptable number of white guys in that side regardless of what may be said to the contrary.
Three and everyone is beaming with brotherly love, four and the grin is like that iced up dog in Planes, Trains and Automobiles, five and there would be howls of protest, six and the water cannon and dogs arrive.

Yeah. We had five in the team on Tuesday (incl. Raza) and I kinda feel that that is the limit....more than that and people get uncomfortable, on all sides. The white players would probably be uncomfortable themselves if there was like 7 or 8 of them in the team - because they'd know if they went on a bad run of results or something they'd be in the firing line and the race wounds would open up again. Just the sad realities of Zim. Probably does need to be a limit and be balanced.
But I'd think Ervine and Williams will probably retire from T20's after the world cup and both of them plus Raza might retire completely after 2023.

But I'd love to see them all back in Zim and playing franchise at least, it would create great interest from all communities. Add Gubbins, Fraine, Compton into that if they are invited back and that's 7 new decent batters to enjoy, plus I'm hearing that there's real interest from other overseas players and that it may well be over-subscibed this coming season.
The counties allow 1 overseas in red ball and 2 in white ball per team. I don't know if that's the industry standard or its up to the individual board and if the latter what ZC's stance will be. Plus there's that Academy side that went to India and I'm sure they'll want to give a couple of them a run.
Spots will be at a premium. What would also be interesting is if they offered a couple of out and out bowlers a spot.

They could go with the standard 5 teams and the batting standard would go up a couple of notches or there's perhaps the option of even having a 6th side? That's added expense and admin so that's unlikely and I think the best idea would be to make the sides stronger.

The ZC rule in recent seasons is 2 overseas per team, in all formats. That includes guys like Curran and Moor who have to be registered as overseas. Compton (and Fraine - he's doing well) have been great adverts for us, should be plenty of guys interested in coming over this season.

If you had 2x overseas per team and all the academy guys getting games and some of the u19's maybe, plus a couple of imports and all the national team players - you probably could go to 6 sides. The problem is, as soon as the national team has fixtures and you take our 16 best guys out, the quality would plummet and be really poor. So I think best to stick with 5 sides and hopefully real competition for places (and hopefully we can get rid of the guys who pay to play). Ideally there's five really strong franchises who pick the best players available, with strong club cricket running alongside and some NPL competitions to bookend either side of the season to ensure everyone gets a chance.

[Yvmnaidu]

bringing uk based players to the team is important for now. we should definitely win against big teams too. we are 15 ranked side in odls. we should definitely win in t20 worldcup against Ireland, Scotland and upset some of big teams too.with Raza and burl , jongwe it won't work out. we want big hitters like Nick Welch, muyeye, Cartwright, Melton, andreodeendal these players. garyballance & eddiebyroom bring odls & test team strong too. we should atleast be in top 10 test playing nation

[CholeZimbo]

Anyone else here think there would be no room for Byrom, Curran, Welch, Ballance, Melton, Evans, Williams, Ervine, Burl and Raza.
That's 9 pink Rhodesians and a brownish guy with Pakistani military training.
They would get that crowd control water cannon to disperse them
I'm just saying there's an acceptable number of white guys in that side regardless of what may be said to the contrary.
Three and everyone is beaming with brotherly love, four and the grin is like that iced up dog in Planes, Trains and Automobiles, five and there would be howls of protest, six and the water cannon and dogs arrive.

But I'd love to see them all back in Zim and playing franchise at least, it would create great interest from all communities. Add Gubbins, Fraine, Compton into that if they are invited back and that's 7 new decent batters to enjoy, plus I'm hearing that there's real interest from other overseas players and that it may well be over-subscibed this coming season.
The counties allow 1 overseas in red ball and 2 in white ball per team. I don't know if that's the industry standard or its up to the individual board and if the latter what ZC's stance will be. Plus there's that Academy side that went to India and I'm sure they'll want to give a couple of them a run.
Spots will be at a premium. What would also be interesting is if they offered a couple of out and out bowlers a spot.

They could go with the standard 5 teams and the batting standard would go up a couple of notches or there's perhaps the option of even having a 6th side? That's added expense and admin so that's unlikely and I think the best idea would be to make the sides stronger.

[ZIMDOGGY]

Anyone else here think there would be no room for Byrom, Curran, Welch, Ballance, Melton, Evans, Williams, Ervine, Burl and Raza.
That's 9 pink Rhodesians and a brownish guy with Pakistani military training.
They would get that crowd control water cannon to disperse them
I'm just saying there's an acceptable number of white guys in that side regardless of what may be said to the contrary.
Three and everyone is beaming with brotherly love, four and the grin is like that iced up dog in Planes, Trains and Automobiles, five and there would be howls of protest, six and the water cannon and dogs arrive.

Yeah. We had five in the team on Tuesday (incl. Raza) and I kinda feel that that is the limit....more than that and people get uncomfortable, on all sides. The white players would probably be uncomfortable themselves if there was like 7 or 8 of them in the team - because they'd know if they went on a bad run of results or something they'd be in the firing line and the race wounds would open up again. Just the sad realities of Zim. Probably does need to be a limit and be balanced.
But I'd think Ervine and Williams will probably retire from T20's after the world cup and both of them plus Raza might retire completely after 2023.

But I'd love to see them all back in Zim and playing franchise at least, it would create great interest from all communities. Add Gubbins, Fraine, Compton into that if they are invited back and that's 7 new decent batters to enjoy, plus I'm hearing that there's real interest from other overseas players and that it may well be over-subscibed this coming season.
The counties allow 1 overseas in red ball and 2 in white ball per team. I don't know if that's the industry standard or its up to the individual board and if the latter what ZC's stance will be. Plus there's that Academy side that went to India and I'm sure they'll want to give a couple of them a run.
Spots will be at a premium. What would also be interesting is if they offered a couple of out and out bowlers a spot.

They could go with the standard 5 teams and the batting standard would go up a couple of notches or there's perhaps the option of even having a 6th side? That's added expense and admin so that's unlikely and I think the best idea would be to make the sides stronger.

The ZC rule in recent seasons is 2 overseas per team, in all formats. That includes guys like Curran and Moor who have to be registered as overseas. Compton (and Fraine - he's doing well) have been great adverts for us, should be plenty of guys interested in coming over this season.

If you had 2x overseas per team and all the academy guys getting games and some of the u19's maybe, plus a couple of imports and all the national team players - you probably could go to 6 sides. The problem is, as soon as the national team has fixtures and you take our 16 best guys out, the quality would plummet and be really poor. So I think best to stick with 5 sides and hopefully real competition for places (and hopefully we can get rid of the guys who pay to play). Ideally there's five really strong franchises who pick the best players available, with strong club cricket running alongside and some NPL competitions to bookend either side of the season to ensure everyone gets a chance.

I think ZC will begrudgingly allow 6+Raza. 7 if there’s a unique injury.
We had that under Streak once or twice.
If I recall we had Cremer, BT, Williams, Ervine, Waller, Jarvis and I think Moor (but maybe Burl) line up.
Good times (except UAE game).

I think regardless of ZC getting racial we just got to run with it and hope that increased success quells any rumblings.

More success makes ZC look good.
More competition makes the black guys on the fringes try harder.
And I’m 99% certain, based on both intuition and social media posts, that the fans would take a much more successful team that’s largely white over a black team that gets belted.
Winning is everything in sport.
Even when players misbehave or cause controversy, when they start winning or move and help another team win it’s all forgotten.

[Kriterion_BD]

I think ZC will begrudgingly allow 6+Raza. 7 if there’s a unique injury.
We had that under Streak once or twice.
If I recall we had Cremer, BT, Williams, Ervine, Waller, Jarvis and I think Moor (but maybe Burl) line up.
Good times (except UAE game).

I think regardless of ZC getting racial we just got to run with it and hope that increased success quells any rumblings.

More success makes ZC look good.
More competition makes the black guys on the fringes try harder.
And I’m 99% certain, based on both intuition and social media posts, that the fans would take a much more successful team that’s largely white over a black team that gets belted.
Winning is everything in sport.
Even when players misbehave or cause controversy, when they start winning or move and help another team win it’s all forgotten.

I agree...the [all black] fans were going nuts when Burl was hitting those 6s. They don't seem to care what color the players are; they just want to see good cricket. Seems only the ZC seem to care about race. Hopefully, the current desperation will change that permanently.

[Googly]

That's not how it works here. Everyone is very happy with a win or a good performance from anybody, regardless of colour. But it is a numbers game and the politics goes on behind the scenes. Obviously less tolerant of poor performances and also waay harder to get into the side.
But if you're in and performing everybody is very happy and accepting. The guys that are playing get treated no differently either, if anything maybe slightly better, that side of it is all good.

[Donald]

Brad evans has took his chance, obviously as well it is a lot more palatable for the..... AHEM!!! Composition of the side shall we say with williams and ervine out

Everyone knows what im talking about.
Brad should be a shoe in for the one day series

[Kriterion_BD]

That's not how it works here. Everyone is very happy with a win or a good performance from anybody, regardless of colour. But it is a numbers game and the politics goes on behind the scenes. Obviously less tolerant of poor performances and also waay harder to get into the side.
But if you're in and performing everybody is very happy and accepting. The guys that are playing get treated no differently either, if anything maybe slightly better, that side of it is all good.

Thats the universal reality of being a minority. You have to be twice as good to get half the credit.

[Googly]

But as I said he will have to do well, he won't get too many chances. But that's OK, ideally he'd like a year to be mediocre and get into it, but he won't be afforded that luxury. Hopefully he gets all 3 games and we and he will see what he's got, it's all most of us wanted to see.
Batting is a bit different, if a guy has a shit start you won't know how good he is, but with the bowlers you can generally see if he's going to make the grade. He's just got to hit his line and length consistently and bowl 135 and be smart at the back end with his change ups. Obviously if he makes some runs that's a big bonus as well, he gets two bites at the cherry.

[ZIMDOGGY]

I think ZC will begrudgingly allow 6+Raza. 7 if there’s a unique injury.
We had that under Streak once or twice.
If I recall we had Cremer, BT, Williams, Ervine, Waller, Jarvis and I think Moor (but maybe Burl) line up.
Good times (except UAE game).

I think regardless of ZC getting racial we just got to run with it and hope that increased success quells any rumblings.

More success makes ZC look good.
More competition makes the black guys on the fringes try harder.
And I’m 99% certain, based on both intuition and social media posts, that the fans would take a much more successful team that’s largely white over a black team that gets belted.
Winning is everything in sport.
Even when players misbehave or cause controversy, when they start winning or move and help another team win it’s all forgotten.

I agree...the [all black] fans were going nuts when Burl was hitting those 6s. They don't seem to care what color the players are; they just want to see good cricket. Seems only the ZC seem to care about race. Hopefully, the current desperation will change that permanently.

Just to further add,
Whenever I see a racially charged post by black fans on social media, 80% of the time it’s usually a comment like ‘we need to let the whites run the game’ or words to that effect. White friendly racism.

Some could be trolling but most appear to just be embarrassed by the team.